Lord's Guide to Terraria Survival: First Two Boss Fights

With the Mining done, It is now time to face off against your first two bosses, The Eye of Cthulhu and the King Slime. However there is some building to do before you should even consiter doing any of these bosses.

Before you begin

Here are my reccomendations before continuing with this guide.

For First Timers

• 180 life
  
• Silver/Tungsten armor or better
  
• Proper arena

For returning players

• At least 120 Life
  
• Iron/lead armor or better
  
• Some flat land (for EOC) Might want an arena for King Slime though

Extra things for Expert Mode Players

• Hermies Boots

Here are some other things you should consiter getting for the fights ahead

• Pink Gel: If you found a Pinky great! Don't try to grind these though, this is just to make life easier with the boss fights
  
• A base (if you were still indicisive on where to build it): I will talk about bases later.
  
• Extra life crystals: If you found life crystals after getting 180 life, hold on to them. You can use them when you are ready to have even more life!

Home Base and new faces

Base

For those of you who haven't built a base yet, do so now. For those of you who have or are going to build one. Here is what you should have (and some optional things).

• Housing for at least three NPCs: Guide, Merchant, and Nurse. If you are eligable for more NPC's (Demolitionist, Dye Trader, or Stylist) Make sure you house them too.
  
• A Bed (Crafted with silk and wood at a Sawmill). This will set your spawn to wherever you set your bed as long as it is placed in the correct conditions
  
• Optional: Housing for the Dryad and Painter when they come.
  
• Optional: Tree Farm for some wood.

My base as of now. Infinite house off camera hosts the Dye Trader (This was before the infinate house gltich was patched)

New NPC's

Speaking of the Nurse, there are some new NPCs you can get. Kinda.

The Nurse
The Nurse will spawn if you meet the following conditions

• Empty house avaliable
  
• Have 120+ life (used at least one life crystal)
  
• Merchant is present

The Nurse's only purpose in life is to heal you. She will charge coin to heal you and to remove any active debuffs (such as poison, or chilled).

The Nurse will heal your character to full health at the cost of copper equal to 75% of the health restored (Ex: She will charge 75 copper to heal 100 hp). Plus an adittional 7 silver and 50 copper for every active debuff on your character.

Traveling Merchant
The traviling merchant, by definition, is not a NPC that will move into town. Instead he has a chance of coming every day, selling 5.5 (6 in expert mode) items on average every time he comes. These items can change depending on his visits, so if you like an item he has, you might want to buy it before he leaves, because he might not sell it the next time he comes.

The Traveling Merchant only requires 2 housed NPCs to spawn, however, since he does not stay the entire day, no additional housing is nessasary for him. Once the conditions are met, he has a 1/4 chance of spawning assuming there is no non-weather oriented events happening that day. He will always spawn near existing NPCs.



With the Traveling Merchant's roster of items, each have a chance of being in his inventory, so I denoted that. The higher the percent means the more likely he will sell that given item whenever he should come.

Name	Price	Chance	Requirement	Comment
Ammo Box	15 gold	1%	None	gives buff to conserve ammo
Brick layer	10 gold	1.5%	None	Building Accessory: Place Blocks faster
Extendo Grip	10 gold	1.5%	None	Building Accessory: Increases Tile reach
Paint Sprayer	10 gold	1.5%	None	Building Accessory: auto-paints objects
Portable Cement Mixer	10 gold	1.5%	None	Building Accessory: Increases wall placement speed.
Presserator	10 gold	???	None	Wiring Accessory: automatically places Actuators, completely useless right now.
Celestial Magnet	15 gold	0.66%	None	Magic accessory: Increases pickup range for Mana stars
Informational Accessories	5 gold	3%	None	He sells three unique accessories - Lifeform Analyzer : Detects nearby rare mobs - DPS meter : Displays your DPS - Stopwatch : Displays your movement speed (in mph)
Counterweights	5g	0.5% (Black) 0.66% (yellow)	None	He sells two colors, each with different spawn chances. Identical in function to the counterweights the Skeleton Merchant sells.
Sake	5 silver	3%	None	Food Item: Gives Tipsy buff for four minutes Tipsy increases melee damage but lowers defense
Pho	30 silver	3%	None	food item: Well Fed for 15 minutes. Well Fed increases all stats by a little and allows Expert Mode people to heal normally.
Pad Tai	20 silver	3%	None	Food item: Well Fed for 10 minutes
Katana	4 gold	1.5%	None	Decent autoswing melee
Revolver	10 gold	1%	After smashing a Shadow Orb/Crimson Heart	it is a gun
Code 1	5 gold	1.5%	Defeat the Eye of Cthulhu	a yo yo
♥♥♥♥♥ Robe	2 gold	1%	None	Magic chest piece.
Gi	2 gold	1%	None	Standalone armor set that gives melee bonuses
Magic Hat	3 gold	1%	None	Alternative to Wizard hat. gives additional critical strike.
Angel Halo	40 gold	0.33%	None	Vanity accessory Item
Kimono	1 gold	0.5%	None	Vanity body item
Fez	3 gold 50 silver	1%	None	Vanity head item
Capes	5 gold	0.66%	None	Vanity accessory item: Four types - Winter : Blue with a white trim - Mysterious : Black and rugged - Red : it is just a red cape. - Crimson : A blood red cape with black accents
Diamond Ring	2 platinum	0.66%	None	Vanity item accessory: Seriously overpriced.
Chalice	50 silver	3%	None	An object to put on tables or other flat surfaces
Fancy Dishes	20 silver	3%	None	An object to put on tables or other flat surfaces
Animal Skins	1 gold	1%	None	Wall hanging item: come in three styles - Zebra : Black and white striped - Leapord : Light brown spotted with a darker brown - Tiger : Orange with a darker orange/black stripes
Dynasty Wood + Shingles	50 copper	3%	None	Asian looking wood texture. Red and Blue Dynasty Shingles are always sold with Dynasty wood for the same price
Team Blocks/Platforms	1 silver	???	None	Come in 6 different colors, purely cosmetic. Corresponding colored platforms will be sold with the blocks. - Red - Blue - Yellow - Pink - White - Green
Arcane Rune Wall	2 silver 50 copper	0.5%	None	An animated wall.
Sitting Duck's Fishing Pole 0.66	35 gold	0.66%	None	If you can afford it when he is selling it, buy it. This is the second-best fishing pole in the game. It is a good steal.
Ultrabright Torch	3 silver	1.5%	None	Brighter torches
Companion Cube	5 platinum	0.66%	None	The most expensive item in the game as of right now. It is literally a Companion Cube (from Portal). it screams at you when it is in lava and tries to stab you when you are in the dark.
Water Gun	1 gold 50 silver	0.66%	None	Doesn’t do damage

Building a Basic Arena

Arenas come in all shapes, sizes, and locations. In this arena in praticular, we will be fighting at least six bosses in it. The first two, being the Eye of Cthulhu and the King Slime. For each boss I will mention arena designs you can use in order to fight the bosses with ease, so check out the sectons about the bosses themsevles if you want more specifics on how an effective arena should look. However there are a few things you want in pretty much every arena you make.

• Campfires: Every arena should feature enough campfires so that the buff they provide is active in the entire arena. Campfires increace your life regeneration in a 99x87 tile reigon centered on the campfire itself, so keep that in mind when you construct your arenas.
  
• Heart Lanterns: This furnature item also provides a life regeneration bonus, but in a 50 tile radius. These do cost 1 heart crystal, so make these only if you are confident in your ability to kill the boss with your current life.
  
• Monster Banners: If applicable (If you think you will be using it for events) placing banners will help you fight off the monsters faster. For King Slime specifically, you might want to have a Blue Slime Banner to help get rid of the blue slimes he summons.

If you don't know, you will recive a banner for every 50 of a single monster you defeat on any given world. These banners grant a +50% damage buff and a -25% damage taken against the corresponding monster. These efects are doubled in Expert Mode. Banners are useful for grinders and drilling through events, such as the Blood Moon we will see later.

The left part of my arena. It is made to fight multable types of bosses. I got a Demon Eye banner while I was building it, so I placed it down to help fend off the Demon Eyes while I build.

Crafting Before Doing Battle

The Slime Crown

To make the slime crown, you need to create a crown (5 gold/platinum bars and a ruby) and have 20 extra gel. Head over to a Demon/Crimson Altar and then you can craft the slime crown. The Slime Crown will summon the King Slime no matter what time of day it is.

Suspicous Looking Eye

To make a Suspicious Looking Eye, you need 6 lenses at a Demon Altar. You might of also found one or two of them in golden chests while you were mining. The Supicious Looking Eye summons the Eye of Cthulhu when used, but only at night.

Optional Crafting

Here are some items you can create to make the fights easier.

Molotov Coctail
Five Molotovs are crafted at a time using silk, 5 ale, a torch, and pink gel. You can get Ale from using a beer mug (crafted with glass) near a keg (kegs are crafted at the sawmill with wood). If you killed one or two pinkies, these are well worth your time to craft them. They do 25 thrown damage, and catch things on fire. This item will be very useful for your King Slime and Eye of Cthulhu fights if you can craft them.

History: Molotov Coctails didn't originally require pink gel in order to craft when they were releaced in 1.3. Pink Gel was added to their recipie to presumably make this item more of a hassle to make, as the other materials are quite easy to obtain.

Buff Potions
While I'd wouldn't reccomend waisting time on buff potion crafting until hardmode when playing Normal Mode, I'd suggest making a few potions if your playing Expert Mode. All Potions are crafted at a flat surface with a bottle on it or at a Alchemy Table (which you shouldn't have at this point in the game). All Potions are crafted with bottled water as well, so I will only mention herb and secondary. Keep in mind for how this guide will cover the King Slime fight, you may not even need any of the defensive potions.

• Archery: If you are using a bow, then then this is a good potion to have. (Daybloom, Lens)
  
• Endurance: If you are willing to fish for the secondary then this potion will help a lot (Armored Cavefish, Blinkroot)
  
• Ironskin: You should make them. they give you defence. (Daybloom, Iron/lead ore)
  
• Regeneration: If you have extra mushrooms (Daybloom, Mushroom)
  
• Swiftness: In Expert Mode, you might want this for the Eye of Cthulhu fight. (Blinkroot, Cactus)

Boss: The King Slime

The King Slime is not required in order progress in the game, however I'd reccomend doing it for his loot.

Basic Information

• Damage: 40/67
  
• Max Life: 2000/2800
  
• Defence: 10
  
• Immune to Knockback
  
• Immune to poison

Spawn Conditions

• Has a 1 in 300 chance of spawning if located in the far left or right thirds of the map on the surface in a forest biome.
  
• Use the Slime Crown
  
• After killing 150 (or 75 if you killed King Slime before before) slimes during the Slime Rain event.

Basic AI and attack patterns

• Similar to Slime in attack pattern (three small hops, one giant hop, repeat)
  
• When damaged, he will become smaller, and summon blue slimes (he will also summon spiked slimes in Expert Mode).
  
• if you get too far away or if it gets stuck, he will teleport to you.
  
• as he get smaller, he will begin to move faster.

Drop Table

Ninja Outfit (one part): 100%: Thrown armor set
Solidifier 33.36%: Special crafting station for Slimey stuff
Lesser Healing potion: 100%
Slimy Saddle: 25%: a very useful mount, and the first one you can consevably get.
Slime Hook: 33%: it has three hooks but it is shorter than a Sapphire hook
Slime Gun: 33%: reskin of the water gun, also competely usless
King Slime Trophy: 10%
King Slime Mask: 14.29%
Treasure Bag: 100%: Expert Mode Only. Will drop instead of normal drops minus Trophy

Coins: 1 Gold

Treasure Bag Drop table

Royal Gel 100%: Expert Exclusive item. Makes all Slimes nonagressive
King Slime Mask: 14.29%
Slimy Saddle: 50%
Ninja Outfit (Two peices): 100%
Slime Gun: 50%
Slime hook 50%
Soldifier: 100%

Coins 1 Gold

Arena Ideas

King Slime can fully jump around 15 blocks (rough estimate). Making a platform around 18-20 blocks high will make it so King Slime can only reach you with a big jump, without getting on the platform. As long as you don't get too far away from him. You can shoot down at him without having to deal with the extra blue slimes. You can also wall him in with a one block thick wall and shoot down with a long range weapon. If you acess to lava, it might be worth making the King slime trap into a small lava pit (don't make the lava too deep, you don't want the drops to burn. Treasure Bags do not burn in lava, but trophies do, so keep that in mind.

Another stradegy is to make a 2x4 pit to stand in, put wooden platforms above it and shoot as the King Slime jumps over you.

Reccomended Armor/Weapons

• Armor: Iron/Lead or better, if using a stradegy to trap him or evade all of his damage, no armor nessasary.
  
• Meele: A broadsword or spear may be too risky as they tend to be small at this point of the game. Use a yo yo, or if you have it, the Enchant Sword, as they have more range.
  
• Range: Iron/Lead bow or better with peircing arrows or Frostburn arrows (flaming arrows work ok), or if you have one, a gun like the Undertaker (Crimson), Revolver, or Musket (Corruption). Minishark is a bit overkill, but it works.
  
• Magic: Any gem staff, Vilethorn (if you have it), or Water Bolt (if you have that too)
  
• Summoning: Slime Staff (If you acually got it)
  
• Thrown: Throwing knives, Shurikens, Molotovs (If you have them), Javalins (If you got them from Hoplites)

Battle Stradegy

The Boss will hop at you slowly and summon blue slimes when damaged. If you are using a stradegy that traps or prevents the King Slime from harming you at all, then all you need to do is stay close (but not too close) and shoot him down till he dies. If you aren't using a cheese stradegy on him, keep your distance and even use gernades or another attack that hits more than one enemy to clear the blue slimes.

Expert Mode Stradegy

Not very much diffrent from the normal stradegy. King Slime will summon spiked slimes as well as blue slimes, so if you are fighting the King slime face to face, it is more important than ever to use piercing weapons with range (like Throwing Knives, shurikens, or gernades) to get rid of the extra slimes the King Slime spawns so you don't become a slimy pincussion.

Boss: Eye of Cthulhu

You thought King Slime was pretty easy? Well good news, the Eye of Cthulhu is a bit harder.

Basic Information

Phase 1

• Damage: 15/30
  
• Max Life: 2800/3640
  
• Defence: 12
  
• Immune to Knockback

Phase 2

• Damage 22/45
  
• Max Life: 1400/1820 (half of Phase 1's health)
  
• Defence: 0
  
• Immune to Knockback

Spawn Conditions

Has a 1/3 chance of spawning at the beginning of the night with the message "You feel an evil presence watching you..." if you meet the following requirements

• At least one player in the world has 200 life and more than 10 defence
  
• At least three Town NPC's are present
  
• The Eye of Cthulhu has not been defeated on the world.

Or using a suspicious looking eye at night.

Basic AI and attack patterns

The Eye of Cthulhu has two phases

Phase 1

• He will hover above you, shooting Servants of Cthulhu at you.
  
• He will then do three short charges at you.
  
• In Expert Mode he summons Servants at you at a more constant rate and charge more agressively.

Phase 2

• Phase 2 activates when the Eye of Cthulhu falls below half health (1400/1820)
  
• In Expert mode, the Eye will summon 4-5 servants of Cthulhu when converting to the second form.
  
• The Eye of Cthulhu will no longer summon servants of Cthulhu and instead charge at you agressively three times.
  
• In Expert Mode, the Eye took lessons from Sanic the Hedgehog and learned to spindash in his second form. As he looses health he will more and more often dash at you extremely fast. At very low health he will just continually chain the dashes so much so that it would be hard to finish him off.

Drop Table

Demonite Ore: 100%: Corruption Worlds Only
Unholy Arrowp: 100% Corruption Worlds Only
Corrupt Seeds: 100%: Corruption Worlds Only
Crimtain Ore: 100%: Crimson Worlds Only
Crimson Seeds: 100%: Crimson Worlds Only
Lesser Healing Potions: 100%
Eye of Cthulhu Mask: 14.29%
Eye of Cthulhu Trophy: 10%
Binoculars: 2.5%: When held they increase the range you can see by moving your mouse towards the direction you look, your camera will move in that direction.
Treasure Bag: 100%: Expert Mode Only, Will replace all other drops except for the trophy.

Coins: 3 Gold

Treasure Bag Drop Table

Shield of Cthulhu: 100%: Expert Mode exclusive accessory. Allows for a small dash to either side, as well as dealing damage to anything you crash into (very useful for Expert Mode).
Eye of Cthulhu Mask: 14.29%
Binoculars: 3.3%
Crimson Only Drops (all 100%)
-Crimtain Ore
-Crimson Seeds
Corruption Only Drops (all 100%)
-Demonite Ore
-Corrupt Seeds
-Unholy Arrows
0x33's Aviators: 100%: A unique vanity head piece only obtained by opening a Eye of Cthulhu treasure bag on a hardcore character. A refrence to the streamer 0x33, who beat Expert Mode on a Hardcore character.

Coins: 3 Gold

Arena Ideas

Campfires and Sunflowers will work wonders on this boss, expecially in Expert Mode. This boss tends to be one of the more "scary" Expert Mode bosses due to it's second phase Sanic dashes. Dispite this, a simple flat area with platforms high enough to menuver around (either by jumping or with your grapple) is good enough. For Expert mode just make the arena a bit longer

Reccomended Armor/weapons

• Armor: Silver/Tungstan or better. It can be done in iron if you have the jukes nessasary.
  
• Accessories: Substance in a Bottle helps to avoid it's charges, but Hermies Boots really shine here, expecially in Expert Mode. I dare say Hermies Boots are required for this fight (however it can be done without, it is just very, difficult and I dare say requires the slime mount).
  
• Meele: I wouldn't Reccomend meele. but if you insist, use the best yo yo you have or use an Enchanted Boomerang. If you were lucky to get an Echanted Sword, that works here too
  
• Range: Bows with unholy or Jester arrows work great. The peircing arrows can hit the eye more than once and kill the servants. If these items are not as avalable to you, use frostburn arrows, as they do more damage than traditional flaming arrows and have a better DoT (Damage over time) effect. If you got a gun somehow and have the Arms Dealer and can afford it, the Minishark works great against the Eye of Cthulhu
  
• Magic: Vilethorn if you have it. Gem staves work good as well, however have a higher teir one for this fight (emerald or better)
  
• Summoning: Slime Staff if you have it
  
• Thrown: 4/5 dentist agree that Shurikens work best on the Eye of Cthulhu. Molotovs and Javalins work nicely as well if you have them. If you wish to use throwing knives, consiter making Vile powder and making poisoned knives, they will deal a whole 1 more damage on Phase 1 Eye of Cthulhu. oh.. and poison it. For Molotovs, I'd sugest saving them for Phase 2. Gernades do work as well, but they do hurt you if you miss.

Battle Stradegy

before the fight, eat all the Life Crystals you stockpiled, if you found a lot of life crystals and confident you can take on the eye with your current health, then craft some into heart lanterns to use in your arena.

Phase 1
Kill the servants. dodge it's charges. Hit the Eye. That is all. Just pay attention to it's health as well as your own.

Phase 2
Dodge the charges. Hit the Eye. That is all. Be careful though, the Eye does do more damage in this phase.

Expert Mode Stradegy

Before the fight, use all the Life Crystals you stockpiled, if you found a lot of life crystals and confident you can take on the boss with your current life, then craft some into heart lanterns to place in your arena. You should also invest in swiftness potions for Phase 2.

Phase 1
Pretty much the same thing as the normal battle stradegy, you just got to be good at managing the Servants, as there will be more of them.

Phase 2
Now here is where the "stradegy" comes in. Concerning the Eye's Sanik charges, a good idea is to use your grappling hook to transfer platforms, not only will you be faster to get up to the platform, but if you time it correctly and press the jump button at the right time, you will retain your momentum and activate your Hermies Boots automatically. It might take some practice, but in the end it can save you a lot of damage. Also keep in mind that the Eye of Cthulhu also gets a defence buff when he does the quick charges. Be careful. To eveade the charges if you had gotten the Slime mount from the King Slime, you can also quickly jump onto your mount with "r" (by default) and and jump to allow the eye to get under you. The Slime mount will goomba stomp the eye, dealing a solid 36 damage, and will give you a window to get away before the next charge.

Fighting Phase 1 with Shurikens

Fighting Phase 2 with Molotov Cocktails

End of the Guide

Thanks. If there are any typos, tell me. If there is anything I missed, tell me. =)

Also for the two items (the team blocks and the actuator thing), if you can find the chances of those appearing in the stock I will greatly appreciate it. I couldn't find it myself.

Next time on Lord's Guide to Terraria Survival: We explore the rest of the world, specifically the Crimson/Corruption, and fight our third boss.

Change Log

June 20, 2016
-Updated the gude to be concurrent with Terraria 1.3.1.1
--Updated the Taveling Merchant's Inventory to include the new items he will sell.

February 24, 2017
-Added Expert Mode kill video for the Eye of Cthulhu (found under "Expert Mode Strategy") and fixed a few typos.

November 11, 2017
-Revamped the guide
--Fixed a lot of typos and grammatical errors
--Made the Traveling Merchant's stock more readable
--Made Boss Bios slightly more readable
--Added new items to the Traveling Merchant's stock
--Rephrased some sentences that didn't really make sence.

November 14, 2017
-Added 0x33's Aviators to the Eye of Cthulhu Treasure Bag drop table.

[papa nurgle's pizza]

I've found that King Slime (and the extra blue slimes) drops between 1g and 2g50s

[papa nurgle's pizza]

scrary --> scary (Boss: Eye of Cthulhu)
sanik --> Sanic (Boss: Eye of Cthulhu)

[Lord Washington of America]

It could be, true. But that really depends you get the very low chance of getting a Pyramid in your world, let alone one with a carpet.

[papa nurgle's pizza]

I find that the Magic Carpet is useful for EoC

[Lord Washington of America]

Terraria is actually the plural form of Tarrarium.

The more you know ;)

[Lord Washington of America]

First time I fought King Slime in 1.3 was pretty terrable too. I ended up sacking my merchant and trapping the King Slime in his house.

[papa nurgle's pizza]

My guide NPC died while I fought King Slime because he didn't like his house

[Amplify]

I'll help anyone who needs it

[Michael]

k thanks. that brought my hopes up

[Lord Washington of America]

As far as Expert Mode goes, Skeletron is infinitely harder than EOC is. Therefore you cant really use the handgun since it is a dungeon weapon. The Minishark should tear EOC to shreads provided you have ammo to use it. Since you fought King Slime, you can also Goomba stop EOC